Wikipedia

Leafhopper

Leafhopper is a common name applied to any species from the familyCicadellidae. These minute insects, colloquially known as hoppers, are plant feeders that suck plant sap from grass, shrubs, or trees. Their hind legs are modified for jumping, and are covered with hairs that facilitate the spreading of a secretion over their bodies that acts as a water repellent and carrier of pheromones.[1] They undergo an incomplete metamorphosis, and have various host associations, varying from very generalized to very specific. Some species have a cosmopolitan distribution, or occur throughout the temperate and tropical regions. Some are pests or vectors of plant viruses and phytoplasmas.[1] The family is distributed all over the world, and constitutes the second-largest hemipteran family, with at least 20,000 described species.

Like other Exopterygota, the leafhoppers undergo direct development from nymph to adult without a pupal stage. While many leafhoppers are drab little insects as is typical for the Membracoidea, the adults and nymphs of some species are quite colorful. Some – in particular Stegelytrinae – have largely translucent wings and resemble flies at a casual glance.

In the now-obsolete classification that was used throughout much of the 20th century, the leafhoppers were part of the Homoptera, a paraphyletic assemblage uniting the less advanced lineages of Hemiptera and ranked as suborder. The splitting of the Homoptera is likely to be repeated for the Auchenorrhyncha for similar reasons, as the Auchenorrhyncha simply seem to group the moderately advanced Hemiptera, regardless of the fact the highly apomorphicColeorrhyncha and Heteroptera (typical bugs) evolved from auchenorrhynchans. Hence, a recent trend treats the most advanced hemipterans as three or four lineages, namely Archaeorrhyncha (Fulgoromorpha if included in Auchenorrhyncha), Coleorrhyncha and Heteroptera (sometimes united as Prosorrhyncha) and Clypeorrhyncha.[4][5][6]

The leafhoppers are divided into a high number (about 40) of subfamilies, which are listed here alphabetically, as too little is known about the family's internal phylogeny. Some notable genera and species are also listed.